I am an Island
by anonymouth
Summary: My name was Isla Black. I was an Island; I was alone. The first woman removed from the Most Noble and Ancient House of Black. Scorched; forgotten...Pure.


Written for The Black Family Challenge.

Character: Isla Black (b. c.1847)

**I am an Island**

My first definitive memory is when I was 3 years old. I remember one day my mother not being around, and receiving glares whenever I asked where she was. When someone - it slips my mind who; there were many people coming and going that week - took me by the hand after a couple of days and led me, finally, into her room, I can remember the feeling of anxiousness that almost overcame me. I remember hanging back by the door, until this someone gave me a none too gentle nudge toward the bed that my mother occupied. She was holding something; some swirling mass of blankets, and my toddler mind conjured up all sorts of evil things. She motioned me to sit on the bed, which I did. This may be my earliest memory, but I remembered the feeling all too well of the consequences of disobeying.

It had turned out to be a baby, of course. Nothing specifically horrific, though slightly frightening. I was afraid to touch; afraid to ask too many questions, but even then it seemed mother tired of my company quickly enough, for I was soon led away.

I sat in my bed that night, waiting for her to come and whisper goodnight, as she had always done, and as she would continue to do now, I was sure; now that this baby thing had been introduced to the family. But she never came. I stood in my doorway and watched her pace her room with this mass of blankets, shushing. I was sure she had done that for me, once. For the first time, angry tears were etched into my memory. My little brain struggling to comprehend. Isla. Alone.

Elladora, they named her. And she continued to hold their fascination as the days turned into weeks. I grew more resentful; began to play up, and as I was no longer the youngest; the cutest; I would be banished from sight. Sirius, my older brother, took me aside after this happened one too many times for his liking.

"It happens to all of us eventually, little Isla. It happened to me when Phineas was born; and to Phineas when you came along. They'll lose interest in Ella soon enough. But don't expect them to remember you."

He gave me a hug; the last sincere embrace I remember from a member of my family. He held me so tight. I'm glad I remember it, for the following years were a blur of growing up, and before I knew it, he was gone. Dead. He was eight years old. I was six. And I realised with complete certainty that I had just lost the only person that would ever understand me. I was an island; I was alone.

Growing up, Elladora was different. Well, not different, I suppose, but more of the same. _I_ was different, and her attitude, her complete...Blackness, only served to highlight it.

Father once caught me thanking one of our house elves. There followed a two hour lecture on the innate stupidity of the creatures, and their lack of any skill or resource apart from servitude. The lecture was punctuated with demonstrations, which I haven't the heart to ever describe.

I cried that night. Elladora looked at me with the same expression of disgust that she bestowed upon the elves. It seems she took that lesson to heart; I have heard that she cuts off the heads of those that are no longer able to serve.

Starting at Hogwarts was a relief. Of course, I was sorted into Slytherin; Tojours Pur after all. But I was relatively free. Except Phineas would take it upon himself to try and choose my friends. Or more specifically, my enemies. I found out that it would be best to seemingly comply with him, for that first summer when we returned home, he reported that I had made mudblood friendships. I was beaten, but forgiven. It was my first year; I was only young; I had learned my lesson now. One that a Black should never forget. I couldn't look at my family for the rest of the holidays. Every holiday after got progressively worse.

My last year at Hogwarts, I had decided that I couldn't live this life any longer; pretending to harbour all that hatred was far more strenuous than if I'd actually felt it. I couldn't hate someone just because of their blood, their family. No; I couldn't hate muggle-borns. What I could hate and loathe was the supremacy that my family, the Black family, thought that so-called pure blood gave them.

That summer, that last summer, I tried to fit in, one last time. But as I attended the family gatherings, listened to the discussions and debates, and the marriage arrangements between the Black and other 'Noble Houses', all I felt was hollow. And sick. If that's what being a pure blood was, I decided that I'd rather be a traitor.

Elladora was the first to realise that I was leaving. Even though we had never got on, she still shouted for mother first, knowing, I think, that I wouldn't have got past father alive.

By the time she got to my room, I had all my belongings packed and shrunk. She grabbed my arm; the most physical contact I'd had in close to a decade. I kept the bruises until they faded naturally; a reminder of who I wasn't.

What surprised me was the flash of fear and sadness I saw in her eyes. Quickly replaced by anger, of course. But I'd seen it. And I made sure I remembered it. Remembered it to make sure that I never ended up that person, and strived to be the one that, perhaps, she could have been, in another life; another time.

"You are a member of the most noble and ancient house of Black." She hissed at me. "And you will act like it."

I didn't shout, or argue. I just shook my head. And I met her eyes. Whatever she saw made her pull back.

"We both have vastly different ideas of what constitutes noble. Goodbye mother."

And I left.

I saw my family occasionally, but made sure that they never saw me. Or if they did, they pretended not to.

When I married Bob, I found out that I had been scorched from the family tree. I was surprised it hadn't happened before. Some part of me wonders whether it was my mother who held out, perhaps hoping that I would return; take my place as a true Black. I wonder, but not with sentimentality. Or regret.

Isla Hitchens, nee Black. The first woman scorched off the family tree of The Most Noble and Ancient House of Black.

One is more likely to find purity and nobility, I realise, in the names that are no longer seen or spoken.

I am an island, but I am no longer alone.


End file.
